Milton of Satan:
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is spear, to equal which the tallest pineHewn on Norwegian hills, to be the mastOf some great admiral, were but a wand,He walked with. His diction was, in his own time, censured as negligent. He seems not tohave known, or not to have considered, that words, being arbitrary, mustowe their power to association, and have the influence, and that only,which custom has given them. Language is the dress of thought: and,as the noblest mien, or most graceful action, would be degraded andobscured by a garb appropriated to the gross employments of rusticks ormechanicks; so the most heroick sentiments will lose their efficacy, andthe most splendid ideas drop their magnificence, if they are conveyed bywords used commonly upon low and trivial occasions, debased by vulgarmouths, and contaminated by inelegant applications. Truth, indeed, is always truth, and reason is always reason; they havean intrinsick and unalterable value, and constitute that intellectualgold which defies destruction; but gold may be so concealed in basermatter, that only a chymist can recover it; sense may be so hidden inunrefined and plebeian words, that none but philosophers can distinguishit; and both may be so buried in impurities, as not to pay the cost oftheir extraction. The diction, being the vehicle of the thoughts, first presents itself tothe intellectual eye; and, if the first appearance offends, a furtherknowledge is not often sought. Whatever professes to benefit bypleasing, must please at once. The pleasures of the mind imply somethingsudden and unexpected; that which elevates must always surprise. Whatis perceived by slow degrees may gratify us with the consciousness ofimprovement, but will never strike with the sense of pleasure. Of all this, Cowley appears to have been without knowledge, or withoutcare. He makes no selection of words, nor seeks any neatness of phrase:he has no elegancies, either lucky or elaborate: as his endeavours wererather to impress sentences upon the understanding than images onthe fancy, he has few epithets, and those scattered without peculiarpropriety or nice adaptation. It seems to follow from the necessity ofthe subject, rather than the care of the writer, that the diction of hisheroick poem is less familiar than that of his slightest writings. Hehas given not the same numbers, but the same diction, to the gentleAnacreon and the tempestuous Pindar. His versification seems to have had very little of his care; and, ifwhat he thinks be true, that his numbers are unmusical only when theyare ill read, the art of reading them is at present lost; for they arecommonly harsh to modern ears. He has, indeed, many noble lines, such asthe feeble care of Waller never could produce. The bulk of his thoughtssometimes swelled his verse to unexpected and inevitable grandeur; buthis excellence of this kind is merely fortuitous: he sinks willinglydown to his general carelessness, and avoids, with very little care,either meanness or asperity.
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